


The Beginning of the End

by Stilienski



Series: Sterek ficlets [20]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek Hale, Attempt at Humor, Emissary Stiles Stilinski, M/M, Sterek Week 2017, Unicorn horn dildos, sterekalphaemissary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2019-01-22 21:29:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12491260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stilienski/pseuds/Stilienski
Summary: When Derek Hale unexpectedly becomes the alpha heir of the Hale pack, he needs to take his socially awkward ass to Stiles Stilinski because apparently that annoying kid is supposed to be his emissary.It doesn't exactly go down well.





	The Beginning of the End

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CheyanneChika](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CheyanneChika/gifts).



> Aaaaand, this is my first post in 8 months... almost to the day. Thank god that Sterek week motivated me to write, or this account would probably die a very lonely death. 
> 
> I also used [this prompt](http://dailyau.tumblr.com/post/147815504810/i-refuse-to-be-the-chosen-one-fuck-your-prophecy) that I'd bookmarked ages ago. 
> 
> This is unbeta'ed! because I'm the worst procrastinator and finished this way too late...

“This is all your fault! I told you this would happen!” Stiles shouted at Derek just as he stumbled for the umpteenth time during their latest chase.

Derek quickly looked over his shoulder as he helped Stiles regain his footing. “Is this really the time for I told you so’s?”

“Yes!” Stiles had never been so pissed off in his life. “Every time is a time for I told you so’s if I tell you so!” Derek just glared back at him, but at least he kept his mouth shut. “You better find us some sort of cave to hide in, you fucking idiot! Because if I die tonight, as a shish-kebab on the horn of one of those unicorns, it’s going to be your fault!”

“I’m not the sarcastic asshole who picked a fight with a herd of those uptight bastards!” Derek growled back, trying to sniff out a hiding place as Stiles had suggested. They couldn’t keep running the whole night.

Stiles snorted, shoving non-too-gently at Derek’s shoulder. “You’re the one who knows all about this stuff! You could have told me these things don’t have any sense of humour before I pissed them off!” Derek grabbed Stiles’ hand and tugged him into a different direction, Stiles only just managing to keep upright. “And you know damn well that’s not what I’m talking about!”

Derek pressed his lips tighter together, arguing further wouldn’t get them anywhere. And it’s not like Stiles was wrong, Derek knew exactly what got Stiles so pissed off. Because yes, Stiles did tell him, repeatedly. He told Derek just how stupid he was when this whole thing started months ago.

*****

For Derek, the beginning of the end had started off with a marriage. Laura would kill him for saying that, but it was true. If she hadn’t gotten married to the oldest beta in the Davidson pack, he wouldn’t have suddenly become the next in line to be the Hale alpha. He wasn’t alpha material. At all. And he would have gladly passed it up to Cora if she hadn’t been off to see the world.

Laura had been prepared to be alpha from the second she was born. She had every single quality desired in a good alpha, she was perfect for the job. She had enough confidence to lead people, but not too much to turn into Peter 2.0. She was a quick thinker and didn’t shy away from making decisions. She was strong, not just physically, but emotionally as well. She was someone you could always depend on, someone who could inspire anyone, someone who was patient, open-minded and positive. Laura had always been someone who you wanted to rally behind. And most importantly, she actually wanted to be an alpha.

Sadly, the Davidson pack had seen all that as well, and since Laura was older than the alpha-heir, they’d given the position to her. Probably because the Hale name would give their pack more notoriety. (Also because Laura would be a magnificent alpha, let’s face it).

But that left Derek to pick up the role he definitely didn’t want at all. He wasn’t his sister. He wasn’t good with people, he was indecisive, he was closed-off, a bit of a loner, impatient as fuck, and just not really into this whole “leading a pack” thing.

And now this stupid marriage was ruining his life. He’d been doing just fine studying literature. It was an interesting subject, that gave him an excuse to spend most of his time in the library, and gave him a chance to talk to people even less. Cause no one wanted to hear him talk about literature. But now his mother was constantly on his back about this or that. He had to do so much, it was like he barely had a moment to himself anymore.

Derek spent entire nights in his dad’s study being taught about pack history and werewolf rituals, about the pack territory, about old treaties and pack wars and strategies used in those. It was boring, but it was the easiest part so far. He also had to train with his mother to learn how to fight as an alpha, which was just plain embarrassing. His life had been freaking wonderful before but now there wasn’t a day that went by where Derek didn’t get his ass kicked by his own mother.

And honestly, the fight training was far from the worst thing to come out of this. Which meant that the other stuff just came straight out of one of his worst nightmares. He had to take extra classes on public speaking, hands-on classes… where students had to participate and speak in front of an entire auditorium about the silliest topics. It was torture. Pure and utter torture. He’d stand there, stammering for 20 minutes, his cheeks and ears turning red, his heart pounding away so loud he couldn’t believe the humans couldn’t hear it. It was the worst.

He thought that’d be it, that his mom had brought him enough nightmare fodder, but no. The worst moments were yet to come!

One night, his mom came in his room where he was quietly, happily reading a book, and she told him…  _ wait for  _ it…. to make friends. Derek Hale was a 21 year old man, whose mother was planning on teaching him to make friends. You’d think it’d be a bit late in his upbringing to finally handle that topic, but apparently it’s never too late to learn something new.

So, Derek ended up being the only alpha-heir forced by his mother to go to some sort of pack networking event. He’d never wished more for the ground to swallow him whole than that hour where he awkwardly stood by the snack table desperately avoiding all social interaction. Luckily he wasn’t the only stand-offish loner who really enjoyed the mini hotdogs.

You’d be surprised how quickly and quietly socially awkward people can bond over great food and not wanting to be somewhere. It’s how he met Boyd. They barely spoke 10 sentences outside of exchanging numbers.

Yep, Derek Hale’s path to becoming a promising alpha-heir was all just a series of unfortunately awkward events. After all of that, there wasn’t even a silver lining in sight. It didn’t get better for Derek, at all. Instead, it kept getting worse and worse and worse…

Up till the moment where he met a certain Stiles Stilinski. Yes, that’s definitely when the nightmare of awkward reached its peak… its climax, if you will.

*****

For Stiles, the beginning of the end started with pizza. Looking back on it, he’s slightly pissed off that such an innocent, delicious gift from the food gods could ever be an accomplice in the ruining of his life. Honestly, Stiles is just relieved that pizza is simply too good to be ruined by bad memories.

So yes, it started when Stiles was just about to enjoy a quiet night in with some video games, some pizza, later probably some porn… when the doorbell rang. It was indeed the pizza he’d been expecting, just not the delivery guy, who was already driving off again on his scooter. Instead there was a ridiculously hot man holding his order, glaring at Stiles as if the poor teenager was responsible for his leather jacket being too tight around the beautifully bulging bicep-area.

Unlike any other pizza delivery boy… man… guy… whatever, this one actually introduced himself. Which might have been unlike any other pizza delivery boy, man, guy, because obviously this wasn’t a pizza delivery boy, man, guy.

“I’m Derek Hale,” the pizza delivery Derek said as he handed the box over to Stiles.

Stiles wasn’t sure what to do in this situation. Because surprisingly, none of the Hot Pizza Delivery Boy pornos he’d watched, had covered the scenario of introductions. “O-kay? Thank you for the pizza?”

“You’re welcome.”

Stiles narrowed his eyes in suspicion when Derek didn’t make a move to leave. “Dude, I’m not tipping you if you’re waiting for that. I’m not a moron, I just saw the guy drive off.”

“I just want to talk to you, Stiles.”

“Okay, Creepy McCreeperface. I’m just going to do you a massive favour here and pretend to assume you read that name on the receipt of my pizza order that you just happened to intercept for some undoubtedly innocent reason. Kudos for your awesome observation skills. Now listen very carefully to me subtly mentioning that my dad is the Sheriff, and I’ll observe you walking away.” Honestly, Stiles would not mind one bit to observe that ass wiggle its way down the driveway. But definitely  **away** though, ‘cause he wasn’t kidding about this whole thing being creepy as fuck.

Just as Stiles moved to close the door in Derek’s face, Derek’s eyebrows grew even closer together in an even deeper frown. Something Stiles didn’t think was actually possible. “No, I know your name and I know your dad is the sheriff. The pizza just arrived at the same time as I did, and I need to talk to you. Isn’t it common courtesy to invite someone in?”

Stiles couldn’t believe this guy, for once he was actually lost for words. For a couple long seconds, he couldn’t do anything but blink rapidly. “No-o! You’re a stranger! Common courtesy does not apply to tall dark creepy strangers!”

Derek only shouted “I introduced myself!” when Stiles slammed the door in his face and quickly turned the key to close it.

“Fuck off! And I hope you at least tipped the pizza guy, ‘cause if he ends up spitting on my next order, then I will look for you, I will find you and I will throw my spit-covered pizza in your face!”

It’s really Stiles’ own fault he ended his Friday night not by watching porn, but by giving a testimony in his dad’s station. He really should have made sure he closed all the windows and the back door after finding a creeper on his doorstep. It would have saved him a lot of freaking out, maybe he could even have avoided his life being ruined if he would have just made sure the creeper couldn’t get in.

But alas, Derek did find a way into the house, scaring Stiles so much when he just appeared in the living room, that Stiles threw the pizza all over himself. He jumped up from the couch, threw his poor laptop in Derek’s face as a distraction and ran up the stairs to lock himself in his room where he finally called his dad.

Stiles ended up not pressing charges, because really the look of utter disappointment on Talia Hale’s face, paired with Derek’s  _ blushing ears _ , seemed like plenty of pay-back to him.

“I am genuinely sorry for how my son approached this situation, mister Stilinski. We’ll make sure to reimburse you for all the damages caused in this situation,” Derek’s mother said, which would have been fine, if she hadn’t followed it up with: “Me and my son would still like to have a conversation with you though, but maybe you’d be more comfortable if we do it over a civilised dinner together with your father?”

After which Stiles was back to being completely freaked out again. Nothing is more ominous than someone else’s mother suggesting a serious conversation over dinner.

“Aaaand, that’d be a no to the dinner party. I’d be more comfortable when I never have to see either of you again. No offence, Miss Hale.” Stiles was going to leave it at that, already pushing his chair away from the table, but his dad stopped him.

The sheriff grumbled “Just start talking.” And had this look on his face as if he totally knew what was coming, which was so not fair. Stiles plopped back down in his seat anyway, looking at Talia expectantly. She just elbowed her son, who sighed but started explaining anyway.

“We’re werewolves,” Derek said it as if this whole situation was boring him to death. “My mom is the current alpha, I’m supposed to be the next alpha and you’re my emissary. There’ll be a bonding ritual during the next full moon, so you’ll be expected at dinner then. Be there at 7 and prepare to spend the night.”

Talia sighed, dropping her head in her hand. “Tact, Derek, how many times do I need to tell you?”

“Dad, I changed my mind,” Stiles immediately said, backing off towards the door again. “I’m pressing charges, I want a restraining order. I want a restraining order like right the fuck now.”

“Sit down, son, you’re fine,” the sheriff looked way too unimpressed by the situation.

“Fine?  _ Fine?! _ He is clearly insane! And he broke into our house! God knows what he did to my pizza!” Stiles looked horrified at the thought. “Oh god, you sick bastard, what did you do to my pizza?”

“He’s telling the truth,” Talia said.

“Dear miss Hale, I am 19 years old and have a perfectly functioning brain. Forgive me for not believing your fairy tal- HOLY FUCKING SHIT WHAT IS THAT?” Derek’s handsome frowning face had turned into a slightly hairier frowning face with two glowing eyes and a disturbing lack of eyebrows.

“Derek! For the love of God!” Talia exclaimed, clearly fed up with her son’s antics.

“Tact only goes so far. He needed proof, I gave him proof. I just sped things up, or would you rather have spent the entire night in this interrogation room?” Oh, Talia was clearly not happy with that answer.

Stiles tried his best to tune out the argument that followed, instead turning to face his dad. “You knew about werewolves and it never occurred to you to maybe mention that to me?”

To his credit, the sheriff at least had the decency to look sheepish. “It never came up?”

Stiles narrowed his eyes accusingly. “No, that’s not going to cut it, dad. Because  _ werewolves _ .”

“Would you stop freaking out and listen to me for a second?” Stiles raised his eyebrows at Derek’s audacity to ask him that.

“The reason I’m freaking out is that I listened to you for a second, you utter dickwad! I think I have the right to freak out after you broke into my house and then grew fangs in front of me! Suggest my freak out is invalid one more time and I will punch you in your eyebrow-less face!”

“Fine. You’re right. I could have handled this better. Are you happy?” Stiles started saying something to that rhetorical question but was rudely interrupted by Derek simply continuing. “We’re werewolves. We live in packs. The alpha is the head of a werewolf pack. My mother is now the alpha of the Hale pack. I am the alpha-heir of the Hale pack.” Stiles did not appreciate being treated like a child, but filed the complaint away for later. “Every alpha has an emissary, an advisor who stands by their side. Your mother was the previous emissary, and you’re the next emissary.”

“Mom… mom was involved in this stuff?” Stiles asked the sheriff in a small voice, his dad only nodded with a sad smile on his face. He probably shouldn’t get side-tracked right now. And really, he’d rather save this conversation for a time when him and his dad were both home, getting through a disgusting cup of his mom’s favourite tea.

Stiles turned back to Derek, he was too curious now to walk out anyway. Because werewolves. “What does an emissary do? Because if it’s just an advisory position, then I think I’ll have to politely decline. You don’t really look like the kind of guy who would take anyone’s advice. Case in point: the tact, or lack thereof, your mother referred to while breaking this news to me.”

Oh, Derek did not like that answer. He immediately went back to glaring at Stiles. “It’s not like you have a choice.” He growled out.

Stiles huffed. “Oh buddy, you clearly don’t know me yet,” he said it with a slight shake of his head. “May I remind you that you broke into my house? I have a choice alright. In fact, I think you’ll find I have a lot of choices. I have all the choices here, mister. I have a choice to just walk out, I have a choice to press charges, I have a choice to find evidence of your werewolfiness and out you to the entire world, and I definitely have a choice to not take this emissary… position in your pack.”

“It’s an honour!” Derek growled, offended by Stiles’ threats.

“It sounds like a pain in the ass from where I’m standing.” Stiles said with a dismissive shrug of his shoulders. Oh, he was going to make Derek pay for what he put Stiles through. “Why don’t you convince me it’s worth my precious time?” Stiles smirked, crossed his arms, and waited for Derek to stammer something stupid again. Because obviously, the guy wasn’t exactly good with words.

Derek muttered something that sounded a lot like “screw this,” as he shoved his chair away from the table. But Talia flashed her eyes – which were a completely different colour, Stiles noted – and apparently that was enough for Derek to stay in his seat with a huff.

“An emissary is important to the pack, they help keep the peace within a pack. They help with negotiations with other packs and together with the alpha, they lead the pack.” Derek obviously wasn’t happy about the thought of leading a pack with Stiles by his side. “An emissary also has a spark for magic,” Stiles sat up straighter at that, his interest peaked. “their magic is mostly of a defensive nature. It’s magic to protect, not to harm. All of that makes an emissary… valuable to the pack.” It clearly pained Derek to say that last part. 

“I get to learn magic?” Stiles asked, not being able to hide his excitement.

“He gets to learn magic?” His father asked at the same time, his tone clearly apprehensive and full of doubt.

Derek’s nod was Stiles’ cue to ask more. “How do you decide who gets to be your emissary? Is it like a birth right kind of thing?”

“No, each emissary makes a prediction on who the next emissary is going to be. It’s a prophecy about who will be the next protector of the pack.” Derek explained.

“Oh god. No. Are you serious?” Stiles stood up so quickly that his chair toppled over. “How can you do this to me?!”

For the first time, Derek looked slightly nervous after another one of Stiles’ outbursts. He looked from Stiles to his mother and back again. “Do… what?”

“A prophecy! You fucking moron! You don’t tell someone about a prophecy that concerns them! It’s like… the one rule about prophecies! Because you know what’s going to happen now? My life is going to end in pain and disaster and all my loved ones will die a gruesome death!” Stiles was gesturing wildly with his arms. “That’s what happens to people who are prophecised about! It’s the oldest freaking trope in the world! You tell someone something bad is going to happen and they’re the only one to stop it and that someone ends up being the one to unleash the bad thing in the first place!”

“I can’t believe this! You are literally living in a B-list YA novel with that whole moody yet attractive werewolf thing you’ve got going on, I bet you even spent half of the day shirtless for no good reason, but you haven’t heard of self-fulfilling prophecies? Oh my god! You are the worst supernatural creature in the world! Your furry ass is going to die together with your pack because you told me that I’m the thing that’s supposed to protect your pack. And what’s going to end up happening is that I will be the thing that unleashes the thing that your pack needs protecting from!” Stiles took a short breath and seized Derek up again, who now had his arms crossed and was rolling his eyes at Stiles’ antics.

“You know what? I refuse to be the chosen one! Fuck your prophecy!” Stiles shouted as he stormed out, slamming the door behind him

*****

Of course, Stiles didn’t actually have the self-preservation, let alone the self-restraint, to stay away from the supernatural after finding out about it. He showed up at the Hale house not even three days later. Luckily Derek didn’t open up with some sort of air of triumph, because Stiles was not going to grovel and give him the impression he had won anything. Derek opened with a – apparently standard – glare.

“I figured if I’m about to bring some sort of disaster upon your pack and myself, I better be prepared on how to deal with it,” Derek opened the door wider and stepped aside to let Stiles in. “It will still be your fault though.”

From then on, Derek and Stiles got trained and primed to a lead a pack together. Derek’s father taught them the history of the pack and its territory, but also werewolf history and culture in general. Derek had heard this stuff plenty of times before, but Stiles was gobbling it all up. His interest, his hunger to know everything, and all the ridiculous questions he asked, made Derek eager to learn again too.

Deaton gave Stiles magic lessons while Derek got fight training from Talia. And to work on the bond necessary between an alpha and their emissary, they spent the remainder of their free time together talking about all sorts of things. Stiles ended up steering most conversations to the topic of magical creatures and spent a lot of time having Derek verify things about the supernatural that he read online the night before. They both agreed that the conversation about werewolf knotting was definitely the worst for everyone involved.

It was hard not to become friends with someone you spent most of your time with. But somehow it still managed to surprise Stiles when he called Derek one Friday night just to talk about nothing because he was bored. Not even because he wanted to learn something, which was what most of their conversations were about, but genuinely because he just wanted to talk to Derek and know how his day had been.

They grew fond of each other fairly quickly, but in that kind of way where everyone around them was still convinced they hated each other’s guts. They couldn’t just spend an afternoon together reading peacefully, they had to judge each other violently for their book choice, then annoy each other by reading out loud or comparing the other to the asshole or the stupid character in the book. And of course, Derek couldn’t go an hour without telling Stiles how horribly annoying he was and that he couldn’t believe that he’d been stuck with someone like that as an emissary. And Stiles blamed every slightly irritating thing that happened in his life on Derek and the prophecy.

Maybe it was weird for other people, but it worked for them. They trusted each other. Like Stiles trusted Derek to come with him to find the unicorns they’d overheard Talia talking about.

*****

Derek somehow managed to drag Stiles to a hiding spot. It wasn’t a cave exactly, it was a rock formation with a small alcove between two rocks that was mostly covered by the bush of a recently fallen tree. Stiles had to spit out a couple leaves when Derek pushed him as far to the back as possible.

“Now be quiet.” Derek hissed and put his hand in front of Stiles’ mouth, Stiles’ panting sounding awfully loud in his ears.

“You’re the one talking!” Came the mumbled reply from behind his hand. The sigh coming out of Derek’s mouth quivered with frustration, but he didn’t say anything, following his own advice to shut up.

Not even 10 seconds later, they both held their breath when they heard the fast thuds of hoofs on the forest floor run past their hiding spot. When the sound had faded away again, Stiles bit Derek’s hand in retaliation.

“Tell me what you know about unicorns.” Stiles demanded.

“You don’t think it’s a bit late for that?”

“Shut up, this is still your fault. Are they likely to be angry enough to get revenge?”

Derek glared at him again. “You suggested their horns were only good as a shiny addition to your dildo collection. Yes, I think they’re insulted enough to want revenge.”

“Then we should probably warn your mom, it’s not going to be hard for them to follow our trail back to your place.”

“Fuck…” Derek breathed, getting his phone out to call as Stiles had suggested, but the latter got a suspicious look on his face.

“Hey, have you ever heard your mom talk about anything you weren’t supposed to hear before?” Derek shook his head no, waiting for his mom to pick up. Before she could however, Stiles ripped Derek’s phone out of his hand and ended the call. “Call Boyd, Erica and Isaac. Cause I’m pretty sure your mom planned this as some sort of test for us.”

“What? Stiles, that’s ridiculous.”

“She must have known I’d get curious about unicorns and go investigate. She clearly also knows me well enough to know I’d say something stupid. Which was probably the first test and then we totally failed it already. So we definitely have to solve this ourselves and nail the second test.” Stiles was pretty disappointed in himself for failing Talia’s first test.

“You’re insane, my mom isn’t like that.” Derek shook his head, just about ready to try calling his mom again.

“Maybe your mom isn’t, what about your alpha?” Stiles didn’t wait for a reply, instead he pushed his way out of the hiding spot and finally took the time to look at his surroundings to try to orientate himself. Since he’d met Derek, he’d gotten a lot more familiar with these woods than he ever thought possible.

“If they follow our tracks, they’ll take the long way back to your place. We can run to the creek and take that annoyingly uneven route, with all the trees you knocked over during your fight training. We can intercept them before they get within hearing distance of your mom and distract them till our reinforcements come.” Derek probably shouldn’t be surprised that Stiles had a plan of action ready within a minute. He’d known Stiles was smart, he even had a devious, cunning streak, but somehow Derek had never related that to Stiles being so decisive, strategic and quick in critical situations.

“If we distract them, can you do anything to contain them? Because we won’t be able to fight them all with the four of us, there are too many.” Derek had already started running, Stiles hot on his heels.

“I’d need a while… 10 to 15 minutes at least, but if I can’t contain them, I should at least be able to scare them off.”

They ran through the forest, Stiles doing his very best not to fall every ten feet, and Derek getting all of his betas to meet them. Stiles almost hoped it had taken longer to reach the point where he’d planned to surprise the herd, he didn’t feel ready for this. For his first supernatural fight. For his first time doing magic that mattered. He’d never even done the simplest spell outside of Deaton’s classes.

“You’ll be fine.  _ We _ will be fine. We’ve spent months training for something like this,” He grabbed Stiles’ shoulder. “You are the smartest person I know.”

“That’s because you have literally three friends, Derek.”

“Stiles, you won’t fuck this up. You know why?” Stiles huffed, Derek was really grasping at straws here. “Because when else are you going to get a chance to get a unicorn horn for your dildo collection?” Stiles couldn’t help but let out a slightly crazed chuckle.

“You know, in this B-list YA novel you live in, the protagonist should promise something sweet and romantic to the partner in crime.”

“I just did, please keep up.”

“Dildo’s are not romantic, you asshole.” Stiles said as he slapped Derek’s shoulder.

“They can be if you share them.”

That was all they had time for before the unicorns showed up. Stiles couldn’t do anything but defensive magic yet, and they’d barely covered wards. Which was no use in quick close-up fighting. He couldn’t do much but run and throw a couple vials of mountain ash into the herd. Derek slashed up a couple of their flanks, but there were too many to really do anything.

Luckily it didn’t take too long for the betas to show up. Stiles knew that Derek had trained together with them before, but he’d never seen it. He was impressed how well they worked together, not just as a well-oiled machine of which every piece knew its place and function, but their fighting styles just complimented each other really well.

Stiles took his eyes off of the fight, trusting the pack to keep the herd away from him long enough for him to set up his trap. His plan was to try and set up wards all the way around the fight. Which was a big area to cover but was probably easier than lure the whole herd into a smaller space. The difficulty wasn’t just the surface area though, it was giving the pack a way out.

It wasn’t a hard spell, but he had to use his pocket knife to carve a couple symbols into all the trees that would make up the corners of the area. He could only do the actual spell after each tree had been prepared. He was only halfway done when he heard Isaac scream. When Stiles looked up, Isaac was pierced to a tree by a horn. Derek immediately pushed the beast backwards and pulled Isaac to the other side of one of the trees he saw Stiles carve into earlier.

Damn, the horns hadn’t even looked that sharp, which is what prompted his whole dildo comment that started this whole ordeal. But Stiles really could have done without seeing the wound one of those things left behind. So he hurried along, glad that the pack was able to keep the unicorns distracted.

It still took him three minutes to get to the actual spell part, for which he sat down cross-legged, a short way away from the first tree. He could hear Deaton’s voice in his head as he started the incantation.

_ “The most important thing about any spell is intent. There are wards to keep werewolves away, which even your own pack won’t be able to cross unless you intend them to. You need to focus, Stiles.” _

He’d made fun of Deaton’s wish for Stiles to focus many times before, he wasn’t exactly laughing now. If he fucked this up, the pack would be trapped with a herd of vicious unicorns that he pissed off in the first place.

Yes, focus in stressful situations wasn’t coming easy. He couldn’t keep his thoughts on the spell, on the task at hand. They kept wandering to various doom scenarios, to Isaac possibly bleeding out 50 feet away from him, to Erica torturing him to death if he let something happen to Boyd… to Derek, having worked so hard to become an alpha his pack could rely on, having put so much effort into making this partnership with Stiles work.

He could focus on that, on making sure their work hadn’t been for nothing.

Stiles had no idea how much time had passed before he felt the ward snap in place. “Derek! Run!” He shouted as he prayed that Derek could indeed get out of that place. Erica shot towards Stiles immediately, not being stopped by the barrier, Boyd followed and only then did Derek cross over himself. They only waited a second to see the unicorns were actually held back by the wards before they all went to check on Isaac. He was already healing nicely, but he still looked a little pale, so Derek supported him on their walk back to the Hale house.

“How did that even happen?” Of course Erica was the first one to ask the question.

“Stiles told them he’d turn their horns into sextoys.” Derek said matter-of-factly.

“Of fucking course you did.” Isaac shook his head while Erica started laughing hysterically.

“I’m still blaming Derek.” Stiles shrugged.

“You’re impossible.” Boyd said, clearly fed up with Stiles’ antics.

As Stiles had expected, Talia was waiting for them on the front porch. She looked at Isaac, limping, probably took one whiff of them and came to a simple conclusion. “Of course you said something to anger them. What happened?”

“We dealt with it. And in my defence, no one even told me they could understand English. Which is a pretty shitty move if you’re testing Derek’s alphaness. And yes, Isaac is fine by the way, thanks for your concern.” Stiles was pissed off that her stupid little tests had gotten one of them hurt, even if it was just a scratch for a werewolf.

Talia ignored the insult. “How did you do it?”

“We’ll save the play by play till tomorrow if you don’t mind, after I’ve taken care of my pack. In the meantime, you might want to call Deaton and tell him to do something about that unicorn herd in our backyard. Is it okay if we take over the den tonight?” Talia couldn’t keep the small proud smile off her face.

“Sure,” She stepped aside to let them in, “as long as Stiles’ dildo collection isn’t involved.”

“Sharing is caring, miss Hale!”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed it.  
> Leave some kudos/comments at the door if you did! <3
> 
> Come say hi on [tumblr](http://bilienski.tumblr.com/)


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